I almost posted in the thread about disappointments, but maybe I just haven't run across any articles on this yet.

Is there any information as to the audio qualities/capabilities of the Lumia 920?

My current phone is a HTC Inspire 4G and while it does the trick for the most part in regards to photos, call quality, etc....the big glaring weakness of this phone, IMO, is the audio quality. IT SUCKS.

I already 100% sold on the Lumia 920 regardless of whether or not the audio quality of it is subpar or not. I'd love for it to be something in line with what HTC has on the 8X with Beats Audio, for example.

09-26-2012, 10:52 AM

Mio_Ray

I think there is some Dolby enhancement.

Sent from my Lumia 800 using Board Express

09-26-2012, 01:58 PM

Nataku4ca

one more month... just one more month then we'll find out... arggg..... (well ok one more month and a couple days more, but that sounds even more painful)

09-26-2012, 03:23 PM

jmerrey

Here's something interesting to consider: in the world of audiophiles, being associated with Beats Audio is considered a detriment.

I'm no audiophile; I have a set of beats headphones that I use all the time, and they sound great to me, bu it's still interesting.

09-26-2012, 03:40 PM

alpinestars1z

Originally Posted by jmerrey

Here's something interesting to consider: in the world of audiophiles, being associated with Beats Audio is considered a detriment.

I'm no audiophile; I have a set of beats headphones that I use all the time, and they sound great to me, bu it's still interesting.

That's because we feel like the price is too high for the level of performance it delivers. And it also annoys me because I feel like people buy it because it's cool or because of the marketing.

Because before Beats, I could probably buy great $200 headphones from brands that people haven't heard of, and they'll tell me I'm wasting my money and stuff, why didn't I buy $30 headphones from Target or Best Buy or something. As if spending more money to get a better product is a waste of money.

Then after Beats, of course now everyone buys these expensive $300 headphones that to me don't sound like $300 headphones. So before they're telling me I shouldn't spend so much money on headphones, and then now all of a sudden $300 on headphones is a good investment?

It's just things like that that bother me.

09-26-2012, 03:58 PM

Nataku4ca

Originally Posted by alpinestars1Z

It's just things like that that bother me.

lol yap, that is the most annoying things that marketing does

how do u feel about bose?

09-26-2012, 09:14 PM

pjskiboy

Sorry if i sounded like Beats Audio was the way to go, I definitely wasn't shooting for that. I'm definitely not an audiophile, so I don't know one technology from the rest, just found it peculiar that HTC pushes the Beats Audio with their phone and Nokia doesn't really say a word about the audio playback on the Lumia.

The software looks like something left over from the zune (not a bad thing at all), so I'm not worried about the software side of things; merely the hardware.

My HTC is my only MP3 player and it didn't seem like a big deal at first, but slowly I started realizing I didn't want to carry around any other device than my phone and then reality set in when I started to listen to music on the phone a lot. Just left me wondering if it was the phone or my expectations.

09-27-2012, 12:18 AM

smoledman

Honestly who cares? Most of the time people listen to music off their smartphone via bluetooth headphones. So for me, it's all about the Pure Motion HD+ screen, PureView camera technology, super-sensitive touch and WP8.

09-27-2012, 03:02 AM

thirdsun

Originally Posted by smoledman

Honestly who cares? Most of the time people listen to music off their smartphone via bluetooth headphones. So for me, it's all about the Pure Motion HD+ screen, PureView camera technology, super-sensitive touch and WP8.

Not everyone shares your interests.

Though if you actually listen to music via bluetooth it really doesn't matter since audio quality is limited over bluetooth. I'm more interested in the Lumias DAC. Didn't find any info yet. I want a clean, flat audio output that may actually handle higher bit depth and sample rates as I have a lot of 24Bit lossless audio in my collection.

Beats is pointless - as I said before it's just an EQ setting and you shouldn't mess up your music with so called enhancers.

09-27-2012, 03:55 AM

cedarlog

it has Dolby sound
in terms of sound Nokia really great i always trust nokia with sound even on cheap phones so you shouldn't be worried
there was youtube video comparing Nokia sound vs competitors but i cant find it hope someone could

09-27-2012, 05:45 AM

thirdsun

Originally Posted by torchxit

it has Dolby sound
in terms of sound Nokia really great i always trust nokia with sound even on cheap phones so you shouldn't be worried
there was youtube video comparing Nokia sound vs competitors but i cant find it hope someone could

I guess I can be confident that Nokias build quality also applies to audio components.

Not sure, what Video you are talking about but I suspect it tested the speakers? Personally I don't care for that - I was referring to the headphone output quality.

09-27-2012, 06:19 AM

tissotti

I'm on the same boat with you.
I'm a big audiophile myself (regular member of HeadFi) and sound quality via 3.5mm to me was the biggest disappointment. Loved Lumia 800 otherwise.

This goes hand on hand with the camera performance of the first Lumia series. Nokia is known for stellar, if not of the best sound quality via 3.5mm on N8 and 808 PureView and Symbian phones in general, but delivered something absolutely different to Lumia line of phones. As a owner of 808 PV the sound quality to my customs and Denon's in-ears is best i have ever had on a portable device. GSMarena has also put top marks on 808 on their true testing system.Nokia 808 PureView review: Photo Finnish - GSMArena.com

Lumia 920 at least looks to be so more stellar performer with hopefully more mature OS. Dolby Digital Plus itself for pure music enjoyment doesn't mean much but it could mean that Nokia has put way more thought on that audio department than they did on Lumia 800.

Only time will tell. I got enough trust on them with Lumia 920 that i will have the phone in release date.

09-27-2012, 07:35 AM

mrozanski

Originally Posted by Nataku4ca

lol yap, that is the most annoying things that marketing does

how do u feel about bose?

No Highs no Lows .... must be Bose! I trust my ears to Paul W. Klipsch!

09-27-2012, 10:12 AM

thirdsun

Originally Posted by tissotti

I'm on the same boat with you.
I'm a big audiophile myself (regular member of HeadFi) and sound quality via 3.5mm to me was the biggest disappointment. Loved Lumia 800 otherwise.

This goes hand on hand with the camera performance of the first Lumia series. Nokia is known for stellar, if not of the best sound quality via 3.5mm on N8 and 808 PureView and Symbian phones in general, but delivered something absolutely different to Lumia line of phones. As a owner of 808 PV the sound quality to my customs and Denon's in-ears is best i have ever had on a portable device. GSMarena has also put top marks on 808 on their true testing system.Nokia 808 PureView review: Photo Finnish - GSMArena.com

Lumia 920 at least looks to be so more stellar performer with hopefully more mature OS. Dolby Digital Plus itself for pure music enjoyment doesn't mean much but it could mean that Nokia has put way more thought on that audio department than they did on Lumia 800.

Only time will tell. I got enough trust on them with Lumia 920 that i will have the phone in release date.

Ok, this is useful information - I check with Head-fi very often as well and I'm a huge fan Grado Headphones. Of course I want to feed these high quality headphones with the kind of signal they deserve, but in the age of MP3s, "Mastered for iTunes" and Beats "enhancements" it's hard to get solid info regarding audio components and conversion quality, let alone something like a frequency response curve of the output.

As you mentioned the advertised Dolby processing isn't much help since I suspect this could be some pseudo-surround/3D emulationthe marketing department loves to put on tech spec lists. It doesn't say much about straight stereo quality.

I don't have a lot of experience with Nokia (longtime iPhone user here), but certainly hope they go back to their roots as you mentioned them. Another thought: could it be that audio components are part of the snapdragon SoC meaning that Nokia doesn't have any chance to customize beside software processing (like dolby)? This, of course, would mean that HTC and Nokia basically share the same signal path apart from the useless Beats software layer on top.

09-27-2012, 11:18 AM

Mister Kay-O

For me personally, I don't really mind about the audio quality that's coming out via the 3.5mm jack because I always use my iPod Nano 5th Generation (the best imo) for music listening purposes but knowing Nokia from previous phones I'm sure the quality of the loudspeaker should be excellent.

09-27-2012, 11:31 AM

Mio_Ray

Originally Posted by mrozanski

No Highs no Lows .... must be Bose! I trust my ears to Paul W. Klipsch!

Which Klipsch headphones w/ mic works on WP(Lumia)?

I mean answer call, end call, skip track etc.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

09-27-2012, 02:14 PM

Nataku4ca

Originally Posted by mrozanski

No Highs no Lows .... must be Bose! I trust my ears to Paul W. Klipsch!

lol, it rhymes :D

10-01-2012, 06:34 AM

junz804

Originally Posted by mrozanski

No Highs no Lows .... must be Bose! I trust my ears to Paul W. Klipsch!

Audio Technica for me. They make some of the best stuff around and for a pretty affordable price too,

10-12-2012, 05:18 PM

mister2d

Originally Posted by thirdsun

Ok, this is useful information - I check with Head-fi very often as well and I'm a huge fan Grado Headphones. Of course I want to feed these high quality headphones with the kind of signal they deserve, but in the age of MP3s, "Mastered for iTunes" and Beats "enhancements" it's hard to get solid info regarding audio components and conversion quality, let alone something like a frequency response curve of the output.

As you mentioned the advertised Dolby processing isn't much help since I suspect this could be some pseudo-surround/3D emulationthe marketing department loves to put on tech spec lists. It doesn't say much about straight stereo quality.

I don't have a lot of experience with Nokia (longtime iPhone user here), but certainly hope they go back to their roots as you mentioned them. Another thought: could it be that audio components are part of the snapdragon SoC meaning that Nokia doesn't have any chance to customize beside software processing (like dolby)? This, of course, would mean that HTC and Nokia basically share the same signal path apart from the useless Beats software layer on top.

I've been desperately keeping an eye out for the audio quality coming out of the 3.5mm jack as well. On the Lumia 900, the signal is too weak and doesn't capture enough range and only makes this phone slightly passable for listening to music.

However, I do like that some attention has been turned to the audio qualities of the 920 with it at least proving Dolby® Headphone. This gives me some hope that the DAC included on the SoC will be up to par. Actually I don't know if the DAC is part of the SoC, I'm just assuming.

I did find this link on this site highlighting EQ settings. A bright spot? I hope so.Nokia

10-13-2012, 03:07 AM

Davidkoh

Hopefully the DAC will be decent, then again I only use it while im away from home, I can live without having the highest quality there is, as long as it's as good as my iPhone 4 (which have a crappy DAC).

11-12-2012, 04:49 PM

Steve Ridges

I'm sort of an audiophile - my HT is Klipsch and separate amps & signal processors so I can identify and appreciate nice sound. My previous phone was an iPhone 4. When I connected my 920 to the aux in my truck, I was immediately impressed with the sound. Much more clarity and less distortion than my iPhone. I like it.

11-12-2012, 05:19 PM

igoramadas

Originally Posted by tissotti

I'm on the same boat with you.
I'm a big audiophile myself (regular member of HeadFi) and sound quality via 3.5mm to me was the biggest disappointment. Loved Lumia 800 otherwise.

This goes hand on hand with the camera performance of the first Lumia series. Nokia is known for stellar, if not of the best sound quality via 3.5mm on N8 and 808 PureView and Symbian phones in general, but delivered something absolutely different to Lumia line of phones. As a owner of 808 PV the sound quality to my customs and Denon's in-ears is best i have ever had on a portable device. GSMarena has also put top marks on 808 on their true testing system.Nokia 808 PureView review: Photo Finnish - GSMArena.com

Lumia 920 at least looks to be so more stellar performer with hopefully more mature OS. Dolby Digital Plus itself for pure music enjoyment doesn't mean much but it could mean that Nokia has put way more thought on that audio department than they did on Lumia 800.

Only time will tell. I got enough trust on them with Lumia 920 that i will have the phone in release date.

I have a Lumia 800 (and now a 920) and they both sound quite similar to me. I don't like the Dolby enhancement on the 920, that's just a gimmick which tries to trick your ears and end up bloating the frequencies and giving a fake spacious sound. But I do extremely like the inclusion of the EQ to tune it depending on the headphones I'm using.

With a B&W P3 they basically sound the same, and volume is slightly louder on the 920, like I use 22 on the 800 and 20 on the 920. But with my Beyer DT990 the 920 definitely has a more detailed output. Nothing to write home about, but the improvement is there. With the included headphones it sounds... well, ****.

So I wouldn't say the 920 is competing on the audiophiles arena, but in the end I think no other phone is either :-)

11-12-2012, 07:18 PM

mister2d

I agree about how well the aux port sounds with minimal distortion. I've experienced this in my car.

For the Dolby enhancements, they are more for movies or TV shows that have been originally encoded with surround sound tech. Dolby Headphone sounds quite nice while watching a movie or TV show using the Plex app.

Sent from my Nexus 7

11-12-2012, 08:57 PM

karmamule

I've owned both the HTC Rezound and the HTC One X (both had Beats Audio) and think the 920 sounds better than either of those. I listen to lots of music on my cell phones and think the 920's sound is excellent.